


The one thing you could never do

by Dylanobrienisbatman



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Amnesia, Detectives, F/M, First Kiss, It Happened in a Dream, Love Confessions, Mystery, Romance, Tattoos, Temporary Amnesia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-06
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-19 10:15:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29873139
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dylanobrienisbatman/pseuds/Dylanobrienisbatman
Summary: Echo Espaco is a victim of one of the most prolific child kidnappers in the world, and it definitely did a number on her, but she has channeled that into solving child abduction cases, which is how she met Bellamy Blake, a detective with the NYPD, and the love of her life. Only... he doesn't know that.So when Echo is on a case and gets knocked out, and suddenly her world seems perfect, where she has everything she wants, a nagging feeling in the back of her mind pushes her to remember.Will she solve the case and figure out what it is she needs to remember?WIll she get to keep the guy?
Relationships: Bellamy Blake/Echo
Comments: 3
Kudos: 8
Collections: TROPED: Madness 2.0





	The one thing you could never do

**Author's Note:**

> Written for TROPED: Madness for the Qualifying Round! 
> 
> Theme: Romance  
> Trope: Amnesia AU  
> Trope: Tattoos 
> 
> Based on Prodigal Son, episode 2x06!

“Bellamy called, they’ve got a case.” Octavia yelled at her through the closed bathroom door. She finished rinsing her hair and stepped out of the shower. She wiped the mirror clear of the steam and stared at her reflection. The thick black bands of her tattoos curled up over her shoulders and down her arm, the stark difference against her tan skin even harsher in the warm wet of the bathroom. A reminder, constant, etched into her very skin. 

She slicked herself over with lotion, yanked on her clothes, and tripped out of the bathroom as she pulled on her socks. 

Octavia just glared at her from the couch. 

“He’s supposed to call me first.”

“Listen, just cuz you’re his kid-“

“Sister!!”

“-kid-sister.” She said with a glare, and Octavia just rolled her eyes, “doesn’t mean that the press gets priority over the FBI.”

“You don’t work for the FBI. You’re a private contractor.”

“With FBI experience.” She pulled on her coat, the laminate of the consultant badge for the 100th precinct shining. Echo Espaço, her name in stark black ink. 

Her lifeline. 

She yanked her wet hair back into a ponytail and let the door to her loft slam behind her. 

As she strode into the precinct, the officers gave her their usual off white glances. She wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea. But there, on the opposite end of that fluorescent lit, cheaply carpeted hallway? 

Detective Bellamy Blake. The one person who she could safely say was exactly her cup of tea. 

She tried to slow her walk as she passed under the buzzing lights, her heart beating out of her chest a little. 

“Kane’s got a case for us. 8 year old twins, taken 3 weeks ago. We’ve got a lead and we think it’s a good one.” 

Echo was a consultant on child abduction cases, and she was one of the best. It helped that she had been raised by one of the most prolific child abductors in the country. Echo had been taken when she was just 4 years old, and had been raised to believe the wealthy New York aristocrat Nia Winters was her adoptive mother. She had been raised with an eldest brother, Lincoln, a sister only a few months older, Lexa, and a younger brother, Jasper. She had never known the difference, never suspected… until Nia brought home Madi. 

A screaming, terrified three year old was brought into their home in the dead of night. Lexa was at a party with her classmates, Lincoln had been living away for a couple of years, and Jasper was at a friends for a sleepover. Echo had said she was going to a friend’s, but had decided to stay home. She listened, terrified, as Nia and her accomplice had tried to quiet the screaming child, and eventually the noise vanished behind the distinct _thunk_ of their heavy basement door. 

She had called the police that night, and Kane had come to the door. 

She had saved his life, when Nia had tried to kill him, and then… Nia was locked away, and Echo and her siblings were free. 

Free to suddenly come to grips with the horror that their lives were built on. To suddenly learn that they weren’t who they believed themselves to be. 

Ashley Teles. 

Echo Winters 

Echo Espaço. 

It was what her tattoo represented. A strong, sturdy tree, starting at the center of her back, branching off in three directions, down her arms and up to the base of her neck. The three parts of herself, the three branches of who she could be. They were three different women, and she could never go back to those other versions. 

Bellamy’s voice pulled her from her own mind, and she just nodded, following him into the office. 

Detective Harper McIntyre stood in the corner, braiding her thick blonde hair back from her face as she studied the file Kane had laid in front of her. She grunted her greeting when Echo walked. 

“How’s Jordan?” 

Harper and her husband Monty had adopted a son just the week before, and Harper had not been able to stop talking about him. She picked her head up from the file, a beaming smile already spreading across her face, and before Echo knew it she was engrossed in a story about baby’s first bath. 

Kane indulged them for a moment, but he called them back to focus. The briefing was short and to the point, and they were driving off to an apartment building on the upper west side before an hour had passed. 

She stood back, quiet as Kane and Bellamy and Harper interviewed the witnesses and tenants of the building. She observed each one, listened for the lift in their voice or the shallowness of breath, watching for a tick or a twitch that would indicate knowledge or guilt, concern or fear. 

By the end of the day, though, they had nothing. 

She stepped into the elevator of the building with Bellamy, a quiet, pensive mood falling between them. 

“So in a building full of nosy New York elites, not a single one of these neighbors heard or saw anything useful?” She mused, out loud to herself. Bellamy, to his credit, knew she was just talking it out, and said nothing. 

The elevator dinged and the door opened to the lobby, where a woman was standing, waiting.

“Oh, excuse us ma’am.” Bellamy said, quickly stepping out and to the side to allow the woman to enter the elevator. 

“Oh it’s no problem at all! I heard from my neighbor, Eloise Hutchinson on the 12th Floor, that you were looking for some children?” 

“Yes ma’am, we are.” Bellamy dug a card out of his pocket and passed it to her. “I think there are still officers on every floor, and they will likely have some questions for you, but if you think of anything else, feel free to call me directly.” 

“Oh of course! We will be sure to call, and we will be on the lookout, absolutely!” 

“Have a lovely day, ma’am.” 

The woman nodded as the elevator door closed, and Echo tilted her head to the side. Watching. As the doors slid shut, she bit her lip sharply, a puzzling feeling falling over her. 

“We should ask the girl some questions.”

“What?” Bellamy looked shocked, eyes wide. 

“The little girl. She said ‘we’ and she was carrying a bag from a children’s clothing boutique. She has children. Little kids are very observant, and don’t know to lie to us.”

“Oh I remember. I’d say five was around the age Octavia finally stopped just announcing every little thing she saw.” The laugh in his voice made her smile. 

“Exactly. If there was something strange going on she might notice, and she won’t know to hide it from us.”

“Should we go back up and ask? You’re qualified in child questioning.” 

“No, we should wait. We’ll need approval beforehand, and the moms too.” 

“Shouldn’t take too long.” 

“I think I’ll head home. I’m gonna try to mull this over some more. See if I missed something.” 

Bellamy gave her a look that’s made her stomach flip, and she felt herself wave (wave!! Who does that?) before she turned and headed to the train. 

She had only been home for about 3 hours before she left again. She had made food, drank a glass of wine, and even tried a shower to get her mind off this case, to let her mind work the problem in the background, but it was useless. As she padded barefoot across her stone floors, this nagging sensation that something has been missed felt like the beginnings of a pressure headache, so she pulled back on her shoes, grabbed a coat, and went back. 

She wandered down the halls, starting on the top floor and working down, hoping something would catch her eye, remind her of the thing her brain was screaming about, bring some clarity. 

Instead her vision went black as something hit her upside the back of her head with some force, knocking her to the ground. 

The floor was cold under her cheek when she woke up, every muscle in her body screaming at her from the impact with the floor and her head throbbing, but that wasn’t what had woken her. 

Bellamy’s hand, warm and firm, was on her back, and as she stirred towards consciousness, he helped roll her over, his hand now gentle on her cheek. 

“You were hit pretty hard, babe, we should get you checked out.” 

_Babe._ It made her feel warm inside, hearing him call her that. 

“Okay” was all she could get out, her pounding headache overtaking the butterflies in her stomach. He helped her stand, and walked her to the car, his arm around her waist to hold her steady. 

He stayed with her the whole night, for a CT and 3 hours of monitoring to be sure she didn’t have anything beyond a mild concussion, and then he drove her home. 

Nia, her mom, was waiting at the door for her when they arrived. 

“Oh Bellamy, dear, thank you for bringing her here, we were worried sick when we heard what happened.” She fussed, like she always had, and Echo let herself be wrapped in a hug so tight it made her breath feel trapped in her chest. “Oh do come in, we’re all having dinner!” 

Madi and Lincoln were already at the table, playing a game of war with Madi’s favourite deck of cards (they were pink, and shiny), Lexa was reading on the chaise on the other side of the room, and Jasper was emerging from the kitchen with a bottle of bourbon. They all passed a greeting, and Bellamy settled in next to Madi, already trying to find a way to help her cheat to win. 

The sight of him there in her home, with her siblings, sent a cold shock down her spine. 

_Something… she had to remember._

Nia settled at the head of the table, and a plate of lamb was settled in the center, and whatever strange sensation she had experienced melted away into the comfort of her family and Bellamy. 

The night was lively, full of laughter, and it carried to the car Nia had brought to drive them to Echo’s apartment. 

“Okay, so I didn’t know that today was going to go like this when I planned this…” His cryptic demeanor sent the hairs on her neck into high alert, and she squinted at him. He reached out, grabbing her hand and pulling her along up the four flights of stairs. “I know our anniversary was last week, but I was out of town, and I know you said I didn’t have to do anything…” 

“You didn’t, you didn’t have too!” 

“Yeah well, I chose to ignore that direction.” He said, a smug little grin curling across his face as he opened the door to her loft. 

She wasn’t sure she had ever seen so many flowers, beautiful bouquets and petals seemed to be scattered over every surface. Baby’s Breath and little white daisies, chamomile flowers and jasmine perfumed the air, and pretty blue forget-me-nots were dotted about. Tiny twinkling string lights had been strung along her counters and her door frames, and in the center of her open floor plan loft, a cosy little mountain of pillows and blankets were settled in front of a projector screen. From the doorway she could see all types of snacks piled high next to the little nest, and two bottles of her favourite merlot. 

“Bellamy this is-”

“Your mom helped me with the money, don’t worry.” He whispered, pulling her into the room, smiling at her dazed expression. “I just thought, we could do something just us.”

She wanted to feel it, the warmth and love that seemed to be seeping into every inch of her skin, but instead, the cold shock was back. 

_Remember… something important to remember._

But then, Bellamy reached out and cupped her face and kissed her until she was breathless, and the thing she kept forgetting to remember was forgotten all over again, and she settled into the nest on the floor with Bellamy, and let the night pass without thought. 

The next morning when she pulled off her shirt to get into the shower, the feeling came rushing back. 

_We have to wake up. We have to get out of here._

It was her own voice, and her head was pounding, but it wasn’t that that shook her. 

Her tattoos.

For the life of her, she couldn’t remember when she had gotten them… or where. 

Or why. 

The sight of them made her blood run cold. 

Images of some other place, something both familiar and completely foreign, flashed in her mind. Something wasn’t right. There was something… something she was supposed to remember, just out of reach. The thick black lines on her skin were burned into her vision, still dancing there behind her eyelids if she closed them. 

_Something… important._

The thought was purged from her mind when the bathroom door opened and Bellamy slid in, careful not to let the steam escape, and pulled off his shirt too. 

She had a passing thought that her mom might mind if they were late to brunch as she dragged her very hot, very naked boyfriend into the shower with her, his hands sliding over the settled ink without a care. 

They stopped for coffee on their way in. Bellamy figured a little late or a lot late was pretty much the same, and the coffee shop on the corner had the best oat milk lattes. She leaned against the counter as he sweetened his black coffee, drinking in his curls as the morning sun bounced off of them. 

“Admiring the view?” he asked, without looking up. 

“Always.” 

He closed his cup and turned to face her, the look in his eyes making her warm all over, every inch of her skin felt exposed. “Right back atcha.” Somehow the casual phrase felt dangerous, and it made her smile. 

Nia was sitting at the table when they arrived, a brilliant smile on her normally cold and stern face. Echo greeted her with a kiss on each cheek, but Nia stood for a hug when she saw Bellamy. 

“You know, Officer Blake, we’ve just been waiting for you to make an honest woman of my daughter.” The words felt like ice, that sensation came rushing back, but she couldn’t place it. Instead she just took a sip of her latte, ordered a bellini and an eggs benedict, and let Nia coo over Bellamy, who was obviously trying to steer the conversation away from marriage. 

Marriage. The idea of it made her skin tingle. Walking down the aisle to find him waiting for her, starting a life together, in front of everyone they loved. 

A glance across the table to catch his eye told her he was thinking about it too. 

Had they ever talked about marriage? Had they ever considered it? She suddenly couldn’t remember. 

And just as soon as it had disappeared, the cold was back, and a pounding in her head. 

And like she could sense it, Nia turned to her, a blinding smile across her face, and she was dragged into conversation and away from that moment of distrust and confusion. Brunch ran long, and they got a call from Harper half an hour after they were meant to be back at the precinct. 

“Oh my gosh mom, I’m so sorry, we’re on a case about a pair of missing twins and we’re late!” 

“Oh my, well, go, go save the day my darling!” Nia waved them off without another thought, and they raced over. 

The precinct was still abuz looking for the missing twins when they arrived, and that cold, ice in her veins feeling came back at the images. 

_You have to wake up. You have to remember._

Bellamy noticed something was strange and pulled her to the side.

“Is something wrong?” 

“I… Something isn’t right. Hasn’t been since I got hit over the head.” 

“Do you need a doctor?” He was going to start to fuss, she could feel it, and instinctively she pushed him back. 

“No.” She shook her head, trying to paint a reassuring expression on her face, though she felt anything but. “No. I just need to go back to the apartment building. I missed something.”

“Do you want someone to go with you?” 

“No.” She spoke too fast, and she could feel his concern radiating from him “No.” Calmer, quieter. “I just need to retrace our steps. Something will come up.” 

“Okay, well, I love you.” He said, pressing a kiss into her temple. 

And again, like every time he touched her, looked at her, loved her out loud, the ice was back under her skin.

_Wake up._

And as if that realisation, that connection, was the last crack in the facade, the dam broke. 

She wasn’t awake. She wasn’t here.

He didn’t love her. 

She was still out cold, being held by whoever had taken those little girls. 

He was still holding her, touching her skin, warm and sure, like he belonged with her, and she felt her heart break in that moment. Part of her wanted to push him away and leave, not look back, just solve the case and wake up, but a little part of her couldn’t bear it. So instead, she reached forward and slid her hand around the back of his neck and pulled him into a searing, almost bruising kiss. She held onto him for dear life, hoping this memory of a dream might sustain her in her love for him when she inevitably woke up to find them apart. 

He looked dazed, and she could almost see the cartoon hearts floating around his head when she pulled away, and she let herself live in that brief moment of bliss just a second longer, before she turned and headed for the door. 

Her cab ride to the apartment building was short, and her mind was racing with all the unsaid things that Bellamy, the _real_ Bellamy, would never get to hear, but when she arrived, the thoughts of him were put out of her mind as she walked through the quiet lobby and stepped onto the elevator. 

Every floor the doors would open and a cagey, suspicious character from the building would get on. Echo would get flashes of memory, of angry old men dragged from their ballgame, of tired mothers who were too busy to answer, to wealthy housewives who were "just on their way out". People who set off flags in her mind, people who were just a touch more annoyed at the disruption of their day than the others. each one proved null. Every one, an explanation, one she had missed in the moment. 

Until they stopped at the 12th floor and the elevator doors opened to an empty hallway. 

She stepped out into the quiet and peered down the dark hall. A door was open about halfway down, and she walked towards it. 

If her subconscious was going to help her solve the case she was going to listen. 

When she got to the open door, she found she couldn’t go inside, but as she stood there, the epiphany she had been waiting for struck her, and, like any good dreamscape realisation, she turned to find the woman that had entered the elevator from the lobby the day before standing there. 

“You.” 

“I’m quite sure I don’t know what you mean.” 

“The girls, you took them.” 

“Prove it.” 

The children’s boutique. The heavy bags under her eyes. The overly polite, eager to help attitude. 

It reminded her of someone. 

“You won’t find the girls just standing around, my dear.” She whirled around to find Nia standing in the hall. 

_Madi._

Madi, sitting at the table with Lincoln playing cards. 

Madi, who should never have been in that house. 

Nia. Not her mother. 

Her kidnapper. 

“You. This is because of you.” 

“Oh well that’s not a very nice way to talk to your mother.” She sneered, and Echo retreated just a step. 

“She offered to help, we gave her our card, but she didn’t have her daughter with her.” 

“And why does that matter?” 

“I don’t-” 

“You can just come home.” Nia reached out, her fingers like talons in the dark, and Echo retreated again. “You can come back to your family.” 

“You were never my family. You _took me_ from my family!” 

Echo started to pace. The woman, something about her had seemed off, but she hadn’t been able to place it. Something had brought her back to this woman, to this moment… 

“What about Bellamy?”

And, like the earth itself had stopped spinning, she came to a crashing halt. She had known it, when she left the precinct, had known that he was just a dream and that if she woke up, he wouldn’t love her the way he did here, but the reminder, so close to the moment of truth… 

She looked towards the open door, the golden light from within bathing the red carpets of the hallway. The answer was there. She could feel it.

Her nails. 

THe image of the woman taking the card from Bellamy came rushing back. Her nails, a sign of status and class in her social strata, had been chipped and cracked, the glue from old fakes still obvious. The more she looked, the more she was out of place. Her clothes were all wrong, too cheap and too old for someone who lived in a building like this. She dressed to blend in, but she didn’t have the funds to do it properly. 

The dream version of the woman repeated herself. 

“My neighbor, Eloise Hutchinson-” 

“There is no Eloise Hutchinson.” She turned on the woman, who hadn’t moved. “You don’t live here, you’re keeping the girls here!” 

“A giant building with hundreds of tenants? Who would ever notice me?” 

Echo turned, facing the door of the open apartment again. 

She had been on the 12th floor when she was knocked unconscious. She was in that apartment. 

“Think of your siblings. Think of what we could have together if you stayed. A real family.” 

She took a step towards the door. 

“Think of Bellamy.” 

“I always am.” She whispered, and then closed her eyes, letting the loss of this thing she had longed for for years wash over her, and she took the last step over the threshold. 

She woke, her cheek cold against the floor, to the sight of four little feet right in her line of sight. The woman was nowhere to be found, but she knew she’d be back. She wiggled out of her zip ties and helped un-tie the girls, leading them into a closet and standing guard in front of it. 

“I won’t let anything happen to you.” 

She sat up slowly, trying not to scare them, and pulled her phone out of her pocket, and sent a text to Bellamy. 

_At the apartment building. 12th floor, apartment H. I found the girls. Bring backup._

Bellamy arrived before the woman had returned, and when she came waltzing back in they arrested her. 

“How did you know?”

“I didn’t. She knocked me out, but I-” She paused, getting a good look at his face. There was that look again, a soft look that seemed almost too good to be true right there behind his eyes. “I was unconscious. My subconscious worked it out, and I managed to wake up before she got back.” 

“Do you know why she did it?” 

“Perfect twin daughters, dressed to the nines? It was about status. Appearances. A lot like Nia.” 

“Makes sense.” 

She smiled, but before she had a chance to speak the ME came over and demanded she go to the hospital to get her head checked out. 

She imagined him climbing into the ambulance with her, his hand over hers, promising to be by her side, but she shoved it down and away. This Bellamy, the real Bellamy, didn’t love her. So she let them drive her, and put her up in a hospital bed under observation for the night. 

She fell asleep alone. 

When she woke up, though, he was there. 

“I’m dreaming again.” She said, her voice rough and groggy. 

“What was that?” He leapt from the chair where he had been sleeping in what was clearly a very uncomfortable position. 

“This is a dream, I’m still in the dream. That’s why you’re here.” 

“Why would I be here in your dream but not in real life.” 

Blame it on the doctor, who had given her some meds for the pain, or maybe blame it on the extremely mild concussion. That was definitely why she said what she said. 

“We were in love in my dream. But we’re not in love in real life.” 

He paused, and then, to her great surprise, he just smiled. A huge wide smile, almost a laugh, dancing across his beautiful face, scrunching near his eyes and wrinkling his nose. 

“We’re not?” was all he said, and she felt her heart racing. 

Felt. Heard on the monitor. Same thing, though the latter is about 50 times more embarrassing. 

“Because… I am. In love with you.” He was so close now, he had pulled his chair close and was holding her hand, and she could hear her heartbeat in her ears, her eyes glued to his face. “So, if you’re not, that would be pretty embarrassing for me.” 

“No!” 

“No, you’re not?’ 

“No, no I-” she took a gulping breath. “It’s not embarrassing. It’s not just you.” A heavy breath through her nose and the look in his eyes made her brave. “I love you.” 

If he had taken longer to respond, she would have tried to catch the words as they were coming out, to shove them back in, but before she could even think, he leaned forward and he kissed her. 

His lips were warm and soft, and a little chapped, and she smelled like a hospital and definitely had dry mouth, but all she could think was that he was kissing her, and if this was still a dream, she never wanted to wake up.


End file.
